Discrimination against Muslims in the USA.

This article aims to prove that there are high levels of prejudice and discrimination against Muslims in the United States of America.

According to Thomas Perez, the assistant U.S. attorney general for civil rights, since 9/11 there has been 150% jump in workplace discrimination against Muslims, often over religious dress and worship schedules, while Muslim youth can often become the victims of school yard bullying. American Muslims are often accused of not being real Americans because of their faith. American Muslims are often accused of being terrorists and of having aims to take over the United States. [1]

In the USA Muslims make up less than 2 percent of the United States population. However in 2009 they accounted for about one-quarter of  religious discrimination claims filed with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission last year. Incidents of religious discrimination towards Muslims include such things as having head scarfs pulled off or being barred from prayer. So while Muslims make up less than 2% of the population, they have accounted for one quarter of religious discrimination during 2009. [2]


In a survey conducted by Georgetown University and Zogby International in 2004, they found that 26% of Muslims had experienced racial or ethnic profiling, while 70% said they have not been the target of profiling. When you consider the fact that 26 out of 100 Muslims have been targets of religious profiling this is quite a high figure. Remember that profiling counts as judging someone on their religion, race, etc, and does thus this study does not include general insults and other types of religious discrimination. [3]

Also according to the Zogby survey, 40% of American Muslim respondents have personally experienced anti-Muslim discrimination since the 9-11 attacks, and 57% know friends or family who have experienced discrimination, with most of such incidents reported in a work, school, or neighborhood setting. [3]


According to a Pew Forum survey, Muslims experience the most discrimination out of any religious group. The survey found that 6 out of every 10 Americans say that Muslims experience “a lot of discrimination.”  8 years after 9/11, Muslims still struggle to break stereotypes of their religion.  In recent news, Muslim workers who want to take time during the work day to pray have been experiencing heavy discrimination.  Some have even been fired for leaving the office to pray or protest without authorization. [4]

Sources for Muslim discrimination and prejudice don't only come from Muslims. In a poll conducted by Cornell University, 22% of American respondents agreed that citizens should be profiled based on being Muslim or of Middle Eastern heritage; 27% thought that Muslims should be required to register their whereabouts to the government; 26% believed that mosques should be closely monitored by law enforcement agencies; and 29% agreed that Muslim civic and volunteer organizations should be infiltrated by law enforcement. Forty-four percent of all respondents agreed with at least one of the above proposals, while 48% agreed with none of the proposals. This is very similar to the persecution of the Jews by Nazi Germany, requiring them to wear gold stars to identify them and having them closely monitored by the secret police. [3]

To conclude there is overwhelming evidence that Muslims in the United States face mass discrimination and prejudice. Muslims are greatly over represented in religious discrimination report statistics, an extremely high proportion of Muslims have experienced religious discrimination and or religious profiling. Adding to this around half of non-Muslim Americans think Muslims should be registered and kept under surveillance, which all together conclusively proves that Muslims face high levels of discrimination in the USA.

[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/29/muslim-discrimination-cas_n_842076.html
[2] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/24/business/24muslim.html?pagewanted=all
[3] http://www.ces.fas.harvard.edu/conferences/muslims/Heymann.pdf
[4] http://www.libel.com/discrimination